IAP has gradually developed global atmospheric general circulation models, oceanic general circulation models, land surface and hydrological models, dynamic vegetation models, land and oceanic biogeochemical models, atmospheric chemistry and aerosol models, regional climate models, and atmospheric environment models, as well as an ESM that fully couples the above models. The IAP is one of the few international research institutions that has insisted on the independent development and application of an ESM over past decades. Indeed, the development and application of an ESM has been one of the most important research themes of the IAP, having been continuously defined as one of the IAP’s missions towards scientific breakthroughs in the past 10 years. The ESM team was formed in the 1980s and currently has more than 100 members. 

Among the IAP's research divisions, the team mainly relies on the International Center for Climate and Environment Sciences (ICCES), the State Key Laboratory of Numerical Modeling for Atmospheric Sciences and Geophysical Fluid Dynamics (LASG), the State Key Laboratory of Atmospheric Boundary Layer Physics and Atmospheric Chemistry (LAPC), and the Key Laboratory of Regional Climate–Environment for Temperate East Asia (RCE-TEA).